Syed Modi International 2018: Sameer Verma wins the title; Saina Nehwal loses final

Sameer Verma brought a delightful end to the final day of the $150,000 Syed Modi International Badminton Championships after Indian shuttlers suffered three losses in Lucknow, India on Sunday. The third-seeded Verma successfully defended his men’s singles title with a comeback 16-21, 21-19, 21-14 win over the sixth-seeded Lu Guangzu of China.

This was the 24-year-old’s third title of an incredibly consistent season that also saw him triumph at the Swiss Open and the Hyderabad Open earlier in the year. With this win, he also secured a place at the BWF World Tour Finals to be held at Guangzhou, China in December.

Earlier in the day, the crowd met with a major disappointment when three-time former champion Saina Nehwal squandered a 17-12 lead in the first game to go down 18-21, 8-21 to the 27th ranked Han Yue. This Super 300 title was the first ever major senior title for the 19-year-old Chinese rising star.

Once Nehwal gave up the lead in the opening game, she could not prevent her young opponent from attacking and coming back into the match. In the second game, the former World No. 1 had no energy left to provide resistance and the Chinese had it pretty easy.

Nehwal was looking to add to her glory in 2009, 2014 and 2015 at this venue.

A day on from toppling the former World No. 1 pair of Mathias Boe and Carsten Mogensen after four previously unsuccessful attempts, the Indian men’s doubles duo of Satwiksairaj Rankireddy and Chirag Shetty went down 11-21, 20-22 to the second seeds Fajar Alfian and Muhammad Rian Ardianto. The eighth-seeded Indians had a couple of game points in the second game, which they failed to convert.

The women’s doubles pair of Ashwini Ponnappa and N Sikki Reddy finished as the runners-up for the second straight year after tasting a 15-21, 13-21 defeat at the hands of the third seeds Chow Mei Kuan and Lee Meng Yuan of Malaysia.

The mixed doubles was the only category in which Indians did not reach the final. The title was won by the unseeded Chinese combine of Ou Xuanyi and Feng Xueying, who upset the fourth seeds Rinov Rivaldy and Pitha Haningtyas Mentari 22-20, 21-10 in just 33 minutes.